Comfort and Caress
by Kyonomiko
Summary: Set in the oft explored "Eight Year", just a sweet first kiss of the coupling affectionately knows as Dramione. One-shot


**A/N: I considered myself a fan of the Potter series, despite it's heavy lean, at least in concept, toward "Books of Magic" (see: Neil Gaiman). Unfortunately, I became disenchanted after what I deemed the complete "falling down" of the series after book 4. Fortunately, I have found a plethora of fanfiction creators with, in my opinion, decidedly better takes on the conclusion of this world. Draco Malfoy was always a favorite of mine so of course, I'm a little enamored by Dramione lore. There are thousands of fantastic pieces and I'm still reading through them passionately. I'll admit to offering little beyond what we've all seen here before. This is just a sweet one-shot to satiate my need to touch with my own words any ship I find myself obsessing over.**

First he hears the muffled moan. Maybe sob is more accurate. Draco Malfoy enters the Head Student quarters with his usual confident gait but stops short when he sees the Head Girl, thrashing lightly on the couch in their shared space. The book she had been reading when she dozed off is dropped carelessly on the floor, pages folded under and crinkled.

This isn't the first time. He's heard her, through the door when she is in the privacy of her own bedroom, the cries and screams that come just before she wakes. He's even heard her sob herself back to sleep, standing just on the other side of the door, hand on the knob ready to turn if the sounds continue longer than he feels comfortable enduring. She is heartbreakingly weak in these moments and any animosity he had once had for her has withered within him.

They don't speak much most days.

At the start of the term, they had made a peace of sorts. After attempts on both their parts to bid for different accommodations, they both relented and stood staring at each other, arms folded, in the middle of this room.

He was cocky; told her they may as well make the best of it, teasing a flirty insinuation with his trademark smirk. She was haughty, agreed that her eighth year at her beloved Hogwarts school far outweighed the awkward tension of rooming with a Death Eater. She had spat his affiliation with such distaste he had nearly cringed at the venom. But not outwardly of course. He was still a Malfoy after all. His name might not carry the weight it once had, but his sense of entitlement is far too ingrained to vanish with a tarnished reputation. And he planned to shine that reputation right back up as the new head of house. His family's assets were fewer than before, but he still puts the average wealth of a wizarding family to shame. And he is smart. Every bit as clever as Hermione Granger, if slightly less dedicated to the work involved in formal education.

The situation at hand stuns him momentarily but he quickly moves forward, grateful she is in the common room for once and he can actually affect change.

Striding across the room in 3 long steps of his tall frame, he bends down over her and takes her upper arms in his hands. He tries a soft approach, saying her name (surname of course), barely touching her. "Granger... Granger!" There is a snap to his voice. It probably sounds angry, agitated. But he's not. At least not with her. Any anger he has is knowing his family is the cause of these terrors that haunt her. He has heard her whimper his aunt's name. He knows what Bellatrix did to her during the war. Torture would be the appropriate word.

In his mind he remembers standing outside her bedroom door just last week, his head laid against the cool wood, feeling unwelcome shame.

When she doesn't wake after the second shake, he moves his left hand to her cheek and tries again, with no malice but firm and strong. "Hermione, wake up."

Her eyes flutter open and he has a moment, the most split of the smallest second, to feel relief, until her eyes turn to the arm attached to the hand on her face, falling immediately to the Dark Mark. The ugly reminder to every wizard and witch of the war so recently fought. Regardless of your side in the battle, that mark represents loss. But for most, also fear.

Her whimpers become a scream and she backs herself across the plush sofa until her back hits the arm. Tears fall down her cheeks as the panic takes her. Not asleep this time, not a dream. She is terrified of the world around her. Of him.

Her panic deteriorates as she wakes fully and he sees her body, wracked with sobs, slump into the couch in defeat or despair, her face buried in her hands.

He has a choice to make here, but he knows he already made it. He made it weeks ago when she bested him at a game of wizarding chess in one of their rare moments of civility and she flashed him a genuine smile that touched her eyes.

He made it again, with more intensity in the dining hall, watching her approach the Ravenclaw table to speak to her friend Luna, breezy and feminine with no question in the world as to her station and no hesitation in crossing aisles and boundaries. She had looked up at him and noticed him watching, her brown locks tumbling over her shoulders. He'd looked down quickly at the table and did not see her reaction to his appraising eyes.

And he makes that same decision again now, desperate to ease her acute suffering but he is lost, his Slytherin cunning abandoning him, as to exactly how best to do that.

He approaches slowly as to not startle her again and sits beside her, closer than he has ever dared. His body turned to her, he slides his arm around her shoulder and pulls her to him. He's more than surprised when she gives no resistance. Instead she sinks into him, her quiet sobs now vibrating his chest. His free hand, the marked arm, reaches to her neck and holds her head against him firmly.

As her breathing slows and the sobs subside, Draco dares to move his hand from her neck to her face. How easily comfort can become caress. His thumb plays against her cheekbone; the tip feels the delicate flutter of her eyelashes when her eyes close.

"Is it always the same?"

She doesn't ask what he means; just hesitates then nods. "Mostly. Sometimes she kills my parents. O-or Harry. But usually it's just me and her. In a dark place."

His family's manor would be that place. Draco places his chin on the top of her head, seething quietly but never taking his thumb from her cheek, never slowing the pace that is meant to soothe.

She breathes deep against him, obviously fighting to regain control. When her hand raises to touch his left arm, he thinks she will push it away. He imagines her standing rigidly away from him and bidding him goodnight. He will return to his room alone, heart breaking a little for this witch he once despised.

Instead, she wraps her hand around his forearm, not even flinching as her fingers touch the mark. "Thank you, Malfoy."

He smiles a small smile and turns his face down, breathing in the scent of her hair. She smells like Mint and Rosemary, but he already knew that. Her favorite place on the couch always smells the same.

"Can't have you thrashing about in the common area. How would I get anything done?" His smile becomes a smirk. She knows him; she'll know he doesn't mean that. He doesn't and he hopes he's right that she can see through him. He's still Draco Malfoy though. He wears glib like a mighty fine hat.

She looks up at him and he is forced to move his face from her hair, the light scent following him if only in memory and he meets her gaze. "Can I ask you a question?"

His heart flutters at the intimate moment, at her intense dark eyes drinking in his face, and at the anticipation. She can ask him anything and he tells her so with a nod. "Of course." His smirk returns lightly. "But I can never promise I'll answer."

"When did you regret it?" Her eyes falter a little and he wonders where her Gryffindor bravery has gone. Then he realizes they did not falter but refocused. Her fingertips play across the mark and her eyes fall there as well.

His Slytherin nature automatically calculates. What will she want to hear? This is Hermione Granger...

Facts. Knowledge. She will want the truth.

"Before the mark even touched my skin." And that is a fact. His truth.

She nods a little but makes no comment.

Hermione continues to hold his arm, her gaze locked intently on nothing in particular across the room, and chewing her bottom lip in thought. She does that a lot he has noticed, biting her lip. Her tongue moistens the corner as it almost always does when her teeth release the plump flesh. Draco licks his own lips a little in subconscious response. She doesn't see.

Hardly registering that he has moved at all, he has slowly moved his hand down her face, now cupping her jawline. His thumb, continuing to stroke her gently, now just grazes her lip as it passes by. He does not pull her face up to look at him, but he is applying just enough pressure to give resistance if she fully looked down or away.

"You're being surprisingly decent to me, Malfoy." His thumb feels her smile before he sees it.

"I am a surprisingly decent man, Granger. Though I've no doubt you feel you have evidence to the contrary."

"I do. But evidence can degrade with time. New evidence can cast doubt on the legitimacy of old."

It's easily the most clinical flirting in which he has ever engaged. There is such refreshing depth in this girl.

He smirks down at her. Not the malicious smirk he has offered her so many times, but laced with a little humor and a little more fascination. Now he does tilt her chin up to face him, searching her eyes. "Always the clever one. How is it no one has snatched you up?"

She offers a scoff of a laugh, with less humor than his smirk and looks away again, shaking his hand off her chin and dropping her touch from his forearm. "I suppose no one appreciates witty repartee when it's attached to a boring bookish _Mudblood_." Ice drips off the word.

Draco's hand, tracing slow circles on her back, stops moving. When had he even started? "That's an ugly word."

She chuckles darkly. "Yes I know. You taught it to me."

There is a part of him that is incensed and he could easily tear himself away from her, pouting and licking his wounds. He very nearly does. But he takes a breath instead and tries to summon a little of that infamous Gryffindor courage, of which he has very little.

So instead he takes her face in his hand again and pulls her closer to meet his lips. It is a delicate kiss, softly on the forehead just over her left eye. He barely pulls away, just enough that his lips can part but still flutter over her skin as he speaks. "I'm sorry, Granger. I was a foolish child. It look a lot of bad things to turn my head around straight." He hears her breath hitch.

Her hand, the one dropped from his marked arm, raises and she lays it against his chest before letting it crawl like a living thing up to his neck. She rests it there, fingers splayed on his shoulder, and looks back up at him.

"What about the boring part?"

He's so surprised he laughs an honest, good-natured laugh. "You can't honestly think you're boring. I didn't think that even begged a response."

"Yes because handsome wizards have always lined up outside my door."

He shakes his head at her bemused. "That's because you're so bloody brilliant they're scared to death of you. And what about Weasel? He's always been smitten." At the last his voice loses its mirth and takes on a pouting cadence.

"What, Ron?" She waves her hand flippantly, waving the thought away like an annoying insect. "That's just confused friendship. I know that now. He's figuring it out. Last I knew he was figuring it out again with Lavendar Brown and good for them."

She huffs and sits back farther away from him, but not enough that his arm is no longer around her. "Anyway that's one example. One. Hardly makes me a bloody Pageant Queen."

"You have no idea do you? You don't see the stares? Finnegan gaping at you all through potions class as you school the lot of us? Thomas watching you intently while you laugh with Potter? Hell even Zabini can't keep his eyes off you."

"Oh yes? And where I fail to notice all these supposed intimate moments somehow you pick it up easily."

"Yes, well, they're usually blocking _my_ view."

Her head snaps to look at him, studying his face. There is no smirk now. Not even a smile. His breathing is an exercise in calm as he struggles to keep her gaze but not move his body. He wants to pull her close again but it's her turn in this little dance. He's put himself on the line as far as he is willing until she gives something back. Gryffindors have courage. Slytherins have self-preservation.

For once Hermione Granger seems at a loss for words. Instead she tucks a curl behind her ear and looks away with pink blushing her cheeks. Draco decides the blush is all he will require from her. His arm moves from the back of the sofa around her shoulders, down to her waist and wraps around her slender form. He tugs her to him, moving his own body towards her until she is pushed against him.

The curl she just shyly moved behind her ear has once again freed itself and is bouncing between their faces, tickling his cheek. He moves to place it behind her ear as service to them both, but finds once that task is complete, he can't move his hand away from her.

Well he _can _probably. But he won't.

"Draco?"

He smiles against her face but his eyes are already closed and he can feel her breath against his lips. "Granger?"

His mouth finds hers and takes her in a delicate kiss, lips parting to surround hers and nibbling lightly.

Her body stiffens and he nearly breaks the contact but her lips respond with almost undetectable movement so he continues. The hand lightly cupping her face moves back to her neck, holding her tight against him.

When he finally pulls away, she is stone-still and looks at him with half-lidded eyes and quick breath.

"I've been thinking…" he says, baiting her to engage.

"What about?"

"Doing that." He nods, indicating her mouth, his lip curling into an infuriatingly cocky smirk (or so he's been told it's infuriating).

"For how long?" Her voice is tiny. A breath of a whisper.

"How long have I been thinking of doing that?" She nods for him to continue. "Probably longer than I realize. By the time it was a conscious plan, it seemed like I'd wanted it forever. Do you object, Granger?"

"I…no?" She is cautious. Unsure. He can't really blame her for that. He's done his best to be polite of late. But polite for Draco Malfoy, when speaking with the clever and engaging Hermione Granger, still carries a lot of snark, just less cruel, more teasing. He's relatively sure she has no idea how enamored he actually is, even now.

"You don't seem completely positive. Obviously it is your duty as a scholar to investigate further."

She starts to speak but he doesn't give her a chance.

"Let's try again." His mouth finds her faster this time, urgent. When his tongue darts out, licking her lips, that universal sign for "let me in", the request is granted without hesitation. She reaches her hands up now, previously paralyzed but finally losing herself a little, and wraps them around his neck, fingers threading through his hair.

Feeling her reciprocate, Draco groans into her mouth but pulls back to ask, "are you sure yet?"

She doesn't open her eyes; just breathes hot against his face and pulls him back to her. "Shhh…Still investigating." He doesn't even have time to smile in response.


End file.
